As the Trope Namer for Bond Villain Stupidity, and a franchise that's been working for over 50 years, it is obvious that the James Bond movies have this all the time. But even Bond himself can make such decisions that would make you wonder if he did them after taking his martini stirred, not shaken.
- Dr. No: The titular Dr. No lost the use of his hands prior to the start of the film (it's implied to have been caused by his work in radiation). However, he was able to use his genius to give himself mechanical prosthetics.
You'd Expect: That given his genius he could give himself new hands that are both powerful and dextrous. And if he can't, that he'd prioritize manual dexterity since that's kinda necessary for human survival.
Instead: He focused on pure strength for his mechanical hands, enough to crush metal or deliver heavy punches. While certainly intimidating, it's also very impractical and leads to his death when Bond leaves him to die helplessly trying to climb out of an elevator leading into a boiling water tank, and failing due to his lack of proper grip. - From Russia with Love: Red Grant is a genuine Genius Bruiser that manages to fool Bond up until the very last minute, when he has him dead to rights with a gun right to Bond's head.
You'd Expect: That he'd just shoot Bond then and there. It's even the actual plan this time around in order to fake a murder-suicide, so there's really no excuse.
Instead: He taunts Bond about shooting him non-fatally until the spy is utterly humiliated, which gives Bond the chance to tempt Grant with the gold sovereigns hidden in his special briefcase.
You'd Then Expect: Grant is smart, and he knows Bond is also smart. So he should really suspect something is up and just shoot Bond dead without another thought.
Instead: Grant's greed gets the better of him, and he goes for the briefcase, only to trigger a special tear gas bomb (which was rigged to go off if anyone attempted to open the briefcase the normal way). This gives Bond an opening to kill Grant with his own garrote wire. - Goldfinger:
- Tilly Masterson has learned that Auric Goldfinger has killed her sister Jill (the victim famously left sprawled dead on a bed, painted in gold) and decides she wants some revenge. To do this, she decides to take him out by stalking him in Switzerland, where he has his base of operations, and shooting him with a rifle.
You'd Expect: Tilly would do a little bit of research, the very least of which being learning how to shoot properly.
Instead: Tilly rushes off to Switzerland using an AR7 as her weapon of choice, a .22 caliber rifle with pitiful stopping power and range and is such a horrible shot that she nearly shoots James Bond, a man standing several hundred feet away and up from her target, causing him to think that she was targeting him instead.
It Gets Even Worse: She tries to do it again later, when Bond is trying to infiltrate Goldfinger's smuggling facility. In her idiocy, she stops just short of advertising her position on a neon sign and trips an alarm wire, compromising Bond's infiltration attempt and leading them both into a chase that ultimately leads to her death at the hands of Oddjob. - During the fight at Fort Knox, Bond throws Oddjob's metal hat in what seems to be to try to kill him, but it ultimately is to get it stuck between metal bars to electrocute him..
You'd Think: Oddjob would continue beating up Bond since he's now unarmed and possibly succeed in killing him, or at the very least, prevent the bomb from going off and irradiating the gold, accomplishing Goldfinger's plans..
Instead: Oddjob goes to retrieve his hat, and Bond then uses a cut wire to electrocute the bars, along with Oddjob's hat, leading to Oddjob getting electrocuted to death.
- Tilly Masterson has learned that Auric Goldfinger has killed her sister Jill (the victim famously left sprawled dead on a bed, painted in gold) and decides she wants some revenge. To do this, she decides to take him out by stalking him in Switzerland, where he has his base of operations, and shooting him with a rifle.
- On Her Majesty's Secret Service
- Blofeld and his goons are chasing Bond and Tracy through the Swiss alps on skis. At one point, they end up at a road that is being cleared via a snowblower. Both Bond and his fiancé jump the road and make it to the other side, leaving Blofeld and the rest of his mooks to do the same. The first mook approaches the gap.
You'd Expect: The mook to go as fast as he can, and steer to the left as he approaches the gap so, even if he doesn't clear the gap, he won't land directly in the path of the snowblower.
Instead: He not only takes the jump directly in front of the snowblower, but he also appears to slow down before he gets there.
End Result: The mook is shredded to pieces by the snowblower.
- Blofeld and his goons are chasing Bond and Tracy through the Swiss alps on skis. At one point, they end up at a road that is being cleared via a snowblower. Both Bond and his fiancé jump the road and make it to the other side, leaving Blofeld and the rest of his mooks to do the same. The first mook approaches the gap.
- Diamonds Are Forever
- Blofeld locks billionaire Willard Whyte up in one of his penthouses, takes his empire and his identity, and places his super-villain base somewhere in North America, disguised as one of Whyte's many oil rigs.
You'd Expect: Blofeld to put it somewhere in the middle of the country, where it won't stand out.
Instead: He places it on the Baja peninsula, where Bond and Whyte spot it almost instantly. - Mr. Wynt and Mr. Kidd, Blofeld's assassins tasked with killing everyone involved with the diamond smuggling ring, have an unconscious Bond at their mercy twice.
You'd Expect: They recognize Bond as the threat he is and kill him as soon as possible - say, by putting a few bullets into his head while Bond can't defend himself.
Instead: They try to kill Bond through Murder by Cremation and by sealing him into a pipeline. Unsurprisingly, Bond survives both attempts (in the first one, Bond is freed from the coffin by other bad guys when the fake diamonds are found, while in the second one Bond breaks the welding bot and then climbs out the nearest maintenance hatch).
- Blofeld locks billionaire Willard Whyte up in one of his penthouses, takes his empire and his identity, and places his super-villain base somewhere in North America, disguised as one of Whyte's many oil rigs.
- Live and Let Die:
- Dr. Kananga decides to dispose of Bond and Solitaire by feeding them to sharks, which come to feed in a pool in his lair.
You'd Expect: Kananga to shoot or drug the two, then throw them into the water and let the sharks dispose of their remains.
Instead: He has them tied to a rignote which is very slowly and gently lowered into the water. Kananga's mook Whisper actually proves somewhat wiser than his boss and initially tries to speed up the process, presumably so that they'll drown before they can try to escape, but Kananga overrules him on the grounds that he wants them eaten alive. This gives Bond the chance to use the super-powered electromagnet in his watch to escape and foil Kananga once and for all.
- Dr. Kananga decides to dispose of Bond and Solitaire by feeding them to sharks, which come to feed in a pool in his lair.
- The Man with the Golden Gun:
- Bond successfully retrieves the Solex agitator and gives it to his ally Hip, who gives it to fellow agent Mary Goodnight.
You'd Expect: For Goodnight to focus on bringing the Solex to M.
Instead: Goodnight decides to plant a bug on Scaramanga's car. She succeeds... only to have Scaramanga toss her into the trunk. Worse still, Goodnight still has the Solex with her. - After Scaramanga's death, Bond and Goodnight escape his Collapsing Lair aboard his Chinese junk. Unbeknownst to them, his manservant, Nick Nack, has stowed away with them.
You'd Expect: Nick Nack to keep quiet, hide away on the junk while Bond and Goodnight are making love, and then sneak off when they dock. Scaramanga's will left everything to Nick Nack in the event that he should die, and even if his base has been destroyed, he almost certainly still had substantial financial holdings that will now belong to Nick Nack, which would afford him an extremely comfortable life.
Instead: While Bond and Goodnight are getting ready to make love, Nick Nack tries to jump the two from above and stab them to death.
The Result: Not only is Bond a trained secret agent who is literally twice his size, but to add insult to injury, Nick Nack takes so long choosing the right moment to strike that Goodnight sees him and alerts Bond. This leads to easily the most one-sided fight between Bond and a henchman in the entire series, with Nick Nack getting locked up in a suitcase, and doubtless put on trial and imprisoned as Scaramanga's accomplice, meaning he'll very likely never get to enjoy his inheritance.
- Bond successfully retrieves the Solex agitator and gives it to his ally Hip, who gives it to fellow agent Mary Goodnight.
- Moonraker:
- Bond is being all sneaky-like on the eponymous space station when he runs into the Giant Mook, Jaws, from the previous film. Jaws is known for toughness and his metal teeth.
You'd expect That Bond would try hitting a weak spot, evading him, or use his poison wrist dart gun to dispose of him.
Instead He punches Jaws in the teeth. Nice going, James.
The Result: One connection and a "CLANG" sound, and Bond's hand is in agony.
- Bond is being all sneaky-like on the eponymous space station when he runs into the Giant Mook, Jaws, from the previous film. Jaws is known for toughness and his metal teeth.
- Octopussy:
- Kamal Khan has an entire hunting group looking for Bond in the jungle right outside his home. Bond attempts to evade them by swinging on some vines....
You'd expect: ..and does this quietly.
Instead: ...while doing a Tarzan yell for no reason at all, alerting Khan's men.
- Kamal Khan has an entire hunting group looking for Bond in the jungle right outside his home. Bond attempts to evade them by swinging on some vines....
- A View to a Kill:
- Max Zorin, the Big Bad of the film, has fallen to his death from the Golden Gate Bridge after a climactic fight with Bond. One of his Co-Dragons and Nazi Grandpa Dr. Mortner sees this, and fires his gun at Bond until it runs out of ammunition. Not to be stopped by that, he goes to the weapons stash...
You'd expect: ...and pulls out one of the many submachine guns in two racks on the walls. Even if he misses with one, he can still use another set until he either kills Bond and Stacey or runs out of ammo.
Instead: ...and pulls out a roll of dynamite. Which he then lights, and pauses halfway out of the blimp to pose maniacally for several seconds, giving Stacey enough time to warn Bond about it.
End result: Bond cuts the blimp's tether, causing Dr. Mortner to fall back in with the lit dynamite.
Then: Zorin's other Co-Dragon Scarpine grabs the dynamite.
You'd expect: Mortner allows Scarpine to throw the dynamite and kill Bond.
Instead: Mortner gets into a fight with Scarpine over the dynamite.
End result: Nobody throws it and they both get blown up.
- Max Zorin, the Big Bad of the film, has fallen to his death from the Golden Gate Bridge after a climactic fight with Bond. One of his Co-Dragons and Nazi Grandpa Dr. Mortner sees this, and fires his gun at Bond until it runs out of ammunition. Not to be stopped by that, he goes to the weapons stash...
- Licence to Kill
- Ed Killifer is dangling above the shark tank Leiter was lowered into earlier.
You'd expect: He doesn't make it worse for himself, surrenders to Bond and turns himself in to the authorities.
Instead: He tries to bribe Bond with the Blood Money he was bribed to spring Sanchez out of custody, which resulted having Bond's friend mauled by the shark and having his wife raped and murdered.
End Result: A pissed Bond throws the briefcase containing the Blood Money on him and makes him shark food. To be fair, given how the whole movie is a Roaring Rampage of Revenge, Bond would probably have killed Killifer anyway.
Even Worse: When Bond throws the briefcase at him, Killifer actually lets go of the rigging he's holding on to in order to grab it! Greed kills, indeed. - Krest is shown the pile of Sanchez's money sitting in the decompression chamber that "he" stole (which Bond had planted there).
You'd Expect: That Krest would tell Sanchez that he didn't take it and was set up.
Instead: He says that it's "not (his) money", which earns the obvious response from Sanchez ("You're right, amigo. It is mine!"). While Krest was already looking sketchy to begin with, especially after his attempt to explain Bond's infiltration of the Wavekrest earlier in the movie, his weak defense didn't exactly help his case (not helping is the fact that Krest had been drinking and was nervous being questioned by Sanchez to begin with).
End Result: Krest is locked in the decompression tank and is left for his head to explode.
- Ed Killifer is dangling above the shark tank Leiter was lowered into earlier.
- Goldeneye:
- Alec escapes in a helicopter when the train car crashes, leaving Bond and Natalya behind and trapped.
You'd expect: Alec would go on his merry way or at least just kill Bond and then leave.
Instead: He calls Bond over the radio to taunt him about the bomb and tells him that he is going to give him "the same six minutes that you gave me." Not only does Bond now know about the bomb, but gloating over the six minutes also alerts Bond to the fact that the bomb actually has three minutes on the timer instead of six since it signifies how Bond detonated a bomb much earlier in his past mission with Alec.
- Alec escapes in a helicopter when the train car crashes, leaving Bond and Natalya behind and trapped.
- Casino Royale:
- Le Chiffre not only works as a banker for several terrorist organizations, but he also runs a pretty shady criminal operation on the side. In the operation, he buys up company shares, short sells them to other people, and then orchestrates terrorist attacks on the companies' most valuable assets to drive their stocks into bankruptcy, while he earns a swift profit.
You'd Expect: Le Chiffre to only use a special private fund of some sort to deal with this venture, just in case something goes wrong, one of his schemes is discovered and foiled, and he loses money. Granted, he might not be able to invest as much as he could, but he would at least avoid pissing off his clients by losing their money.
Instead: He dips into his own clients' money.
Result: When Bond sabotages his scheme to blow up the Skyfleet corporation's prototype airliner, Le Chiffre loses $101.2 million of the terrorists' money, and is forced to set up a poker tournament at Casino Royale in Montenegro to recover it, and both MI6 and the CIA send agents from their own forces to infiltrate the game with the intention of then bankrupting Le Chiffre to get him to seek asylum with one of them.
It Gets Worse: Midway through the tournament, Le Chiffre himself ends up getting attacked by a pissed off client who has found himself out of pocket.
Even Worse: When he ultimately loses the tournament, he attempts to torture Bond for the password to the winnings, and then is personally shot dead by Mr. White. Mr. White didn't care about the money so much as the fact that the whole incident with the Skyfleet plane has proven that Le Chiffre couldn't be trusted. He also implies that Quantum probably would have still had Le Chiffre killed no matter what the outcome of the tournament.
- Le Chiffre not only works as a banker for several terrorist organizations, but he also runs a pretty shady criminal operation on the side. In the operation, he buys up company shares, short sells them to other people, and then orchestrates terrorist attacks on the companies' most valuable assets to drive their stocks into bankruptcy, while he earns a swift profit.
- Quantum of Solace:
- Bond accidentally drops one of his target's bodyguards off a roof of an opera house. He survives, but is then shot dead by one of Dominic Greene's henchmen. MI6 is notified of this.
You'd Expect: That they'd check up the ballistics and realize that Bond didn't kill him.
Instead: They assume that Bond shot him, and M demands Bond come in for questioning.
To Make Matters Worse: Bond doesn't so much as say "I didn't shoot him," and only quips that he tried his hardest not to kill him.
The Result: MI6 goes after Bond and he is forced to go rogue for the remainder of the movie. - This directly leads into another moment where MI6 tries to bring Bond back to London for questioning.
You'd Expect: M would have multiple armed agents come to take Bond in.
Instead: She sends an attractive redhead named Strawberry Fields, to bring James Bond back to London.
The Result: Bond does what he does best and seduces her, she doesn't take him back to London, and later is killed by Dominic Greene.
- Bond accidentally drops one of his target's bodyguards off a roof of an opera house. He survives, but is then shot dead by one of Dominic Greene's henchmen. MI6 is notified of this.
- Skyfall:
- Bond and MI6 have just apprehended Raoul Silva, and watch him act smarmy and at ease in the interrogation room he's been placed in. Bond goes to check up on Q, who has plugged in Silva's computer into the MI6 network and is blithely trying to crack the code. Bond realizes that the password to the system is an easily-guessed name for a subway station.
You'd Expect: That either Q or Bond would realize something's up (and that a one-word password hidden in plain sight is suspicious), particularly because Silva is completely joking around during an otherwise-serious confrontation with M, or that Q wouldn't have hooked the villain's computer up to an internal network before trying to open it.
Instead: They don't. Silva's computer releases a virus that takes down all of MI6's internal security, and Bond is forced to go on a long foot chase after Silva. - In the above scene, Q reveals that Silva is using a type of file that deletes itself if access to it is attempted, which Q also states that he invented. Having revealed himself to be a cybersecurity expert…
You'd Expect: Q to keep Silva's laptop offline.
Instead: Q connects Silva's laptop to the MI6 computer network, allowing Silva to access said network and free himself. - Later on, Bond and M head out to the Skyfall estate to lay an ambush for Silva. Q and Tanner are in on the plan, and lay out a trail of breadcrumbs for Silva to follow. Mallory comes in and realizes what they're doing.
You'd Expect: That, as far as they know, a single agent and a much older woman (who presumably doesn't have combat experience) are on their own against Silva and an entire force of his men), and would either tell some of the MI6 agents in person to go to the estate to provide backup, or at least give them some support, like the military, or the local police in that region.
Instead: Mallory thinks it's a great plan, and seems more concerned with what will happen if the Members of Parliament discover that they've been forging input files. Though this IS James Bond they're talking about, and he does manage to kill off Silva and all his men (with help from a third character, Kincaide, who neither Mallory nor Q are aware of), Bond had been clearly showing signs of Badass Decay (e.g. not passing MI6's physical exam) for most of the film, which is a major theme in the movie. In any case, he's unable to prevent M from being killed.
- Bond and MI6 have just apprehended Raoul Silva, and watch him act smarmy and at ease in the interrogation room he's been placed in. Bond goes to check up on Q, who has plugged in Silva's computer into the MI6 network and is blithely trying to crack the code. Bond realizes that the password to the system is an easily-guessed name for a subway station.
- Spectre:
- Bond saves the widow of the man he had killed in the beginning of the film and gets information from her while doing what he does best; seducing her.
- While on the train to the base, Bond decides to teach Madeleine how to use a gun.
You'd expect: Bond, a former Naval Commander with an understanding of how to use a gun safely, to wait until they were in a location where nobody's life was at risk.
Instead: Bond ignores the number one rule of gun safety: always assume the gun is loaded. He doesn't even take the time to unload the gun before pointing it at the wall of the compartment (where there might be people).
The Result: Madeleine manages to unload the gun without (thankfully) shooting anyone. She even gives him a look that shows just how stupid he just was.
** SPECTRE agents, lead by Oberhauser have kidnapped James Bond, and strapped him in a torture machine.
You'd expect: Since SPECTRE has knowledge of the 00 program, they search Bond for any possible gadgets, including his watch.
Instead: They don't do that. Bond uses his watch as a bomb, allowing him to escape. - Bond and Madeleine have just attacked SPECTRE's base, and gone back to London. At a safe house, the MI6 team make a plan to prevent C from bringing the Nine Eyes program online. However, after they leave, Madeleine gets cold feet and decides she doesn't want any part of Bond's violent life.
You'd expect: Bond would escort Madeleine back to the safe house, where she could wait for him to return from his mission and bring her home.
Instead: Madeleine leaves by herself and Bond lets her without an objection.
The Result: She gets kidnapped by Blofeld, who survived the destruction of the base. - When SPECTRE's mooks kidnap Bond again.
You'd Expect: Them to tie his hands behind him.
Instead: They tie his hands in front of him. Sure enough, he's able to grab a gun off one of them and kill them both. - In the film's climax, Blofeld hides Madeleine in MI6's former headquarters, which was condemned after Silva badly damaged it with an explosion in the previous film, and activates the timer for the demolition charges scattered throughout the building. This gives Bond the Sadistic Choice of either escaping to ensure his own survival, or trying to find Madeleine and most likely dying when the building is destroyed.
You'd expect: Blofeld to hide Madeleine somewhere where Bond wouldn't think of looking. Or hell, keep her somewhere else and just lie to Bond about her being in the building, so that he'll have a few million tons of rubble brought down on him during a fruitless search.
Instead: He hides her in probably the most obvious place possible, namely M's former office. Bond naturally finds her, escapes the building before it's destroyed, and then takes down Blofeld for good measure.
- While on the train to the base, Bond decides to teach Madeleine how to use a gun.
- No Time to Die:
- The film reveals that in the past, M had pondered the idea of making a bioweapon known as Heracles that kills people based on similarities in their DNA structure, with the justification of only using such a weapon marginally. Not only that, but Bond had called him out on how dangerous a weapon of this caliber would be, and demanded he shut the operation down.
You'd Expect: That M would listen to Bond and permanently shelve the project because there is no reason to develop such a dangerous weapon that could be so easily exploited. Plus, given the fact that he barely planned on using it, there's really no reason to develop it in the first place.
Instead: Not only does he develop the weapon, not only does he keep it off the books, but he hires Valdo Obruchev, an insane scientist with genocidal ambitions to design it.
Predictably: Valdo becomes disappointed with M's plans for Heracles and secretly teams up with Lyutsifer Safin in order to see Heracles used for mass murder. - In the climax, Obruchev has been captured by Nomi, who intends to bring him in alive but is growing visibly irritated by his presence.
You'd Expect: Obruchev to come quietly and make sure not to say anything to provoke the extremely dangerous and competent secret agent with a license to kill.
Instead: He basically throws a tantrum, demands release, fights Nomi every step of the way (even though it could get him killed too), and not-so-subtly implies he could use Heracles to wipe out the entire African race.
The Result: Nomi gives him a Death Glare, says "You know what time it is? Time to die." Then she kicks him into a nanovat, which kills him painfully.- This idiocy goes both ways, however, as Obruchev created the Heracles bioweapon (as stated above) and for some reason MI6 is grossly and unforgivably incompetent against Safin.
You'd Expect: That Nomi would ignore that nasty retort against her race and still keep him alive. Yes, he’s a Politically Incorrect Villain, but since Bond has the virus, and seeing how he has vital information on it (he created it, after all) he could be forced to program it to not affect Madeleine and Mathilde (seeing as Safin reprogrammed it once to only affect SPECTRE members) and then arrest him.
Instead: She decides to improve her chances of survival and completing the mission by killing the very likely only person on the planet who might be able to neutralize or alter the virus.
The Result: While it’s not explored what happened after that, Nomi might have gotten a demotion due to this deserved yet inappropriate abuse of her license to kill.
- This idiocy goes both ways, however, as Obruchev created the Heracles bioweapon (as stated above) and for some reason MI6 is grossly and unforgivably incompetent against Safin.
- All of MI6 gets it bad during the climax. Upon infiltrating Safin's base, Bond and Nomi discover Safin arranged for cargo ships to distribute Heracles.
You'd Expect: That Bond and Nomi would just find Madeline and Mathilde, arrest Obruchev, and leave. M could then call the Royal Navy, explain the situation, and then order them to destroy Safin's fleet. The navy would have more than enough firepower to do it, meaning Safin's "unstoppable plan" is dead on arrival.
Instead: Nobody even thinks of that and they conclude that the only way to stop Safin is to blow up his island and potentially provoke a war in the process.
The Result: While the film ends before we can see the political consequences of destroying the island, this lack of common sense ends up getting James Bond killed. - Bond in particular at the end. After a spectacular firefight in which he kills almost all of Safin's mooks and opens the blast doors so that the missiles can strike, he's leaving the facility when the unseen Safin closes them again, forcing him to turn back. Aside from his foolish failure to kill Safin in the first place, something explicitly stated as part of the mission and something that has clearly resulted in Safin reclosing the silo doors. . .
You'd Expect: That a legendary, trained, skilled and experienced agent like Bond would carefully make his way back to the room, keeping his gun drawn and eyes out for Safin, who is surely lurking around somewhere.
Instead: He rushes into a huge open space with no means of protecting himself.
The Result: Safin guns him down, shooting him multiple times, likely fatally injuring him even if he hadn't decided to cap it off by poisoning in him a manner that would ultimately be lethal to his lover and child, forcing Bond to stay on the island after killing Safin and getting blown away to kingdom come by the missile strike on the island, resulting in a "Torch the Franchise and Run" ending for the Craig era.
- The film reveals that in the past, M had pondered the idea of making a bioweapon known as Heracles that kills people based on similarities in their DNA structure, with the justification of only using such a weapon marginally. Not only that, but Bond had called him out on how dangerous a weapon of this caliber would be, and demanded he shut the operation down.
